Growth & Leadership Insights

Multiple studies agree that value creation is more dependent on successful culture integration than on any other factor; they cite poor cultural compatibility as the root cause for the high rate of acquisition failure. Without a timely and extensive integration of cultures, creating value will not be possible.

Bob Schultek Author of The Gauntlet

The traditional due diligence process evaluates multiple quantifiable parameters to validate the intuitive sense that a specific deal will create value, but often, the least attention is paid to assessing cultural fit because it’s not readily quantifiable.

Business acquisitions are expected to create value. Yet, most fail to do so and often destroy it.

Yet culture is a primary driver of performance, more so than products or services. How committed and synchronized are the leaders of the business in cultivating culture? How consistently do the organization’s people behave in accordance with their purpose and values to produce expected outcomes? How thoroughly do they grasp their role in creating value for the business by producing it for customers? Consider these keys to assessing culture compatibility:

How aligned are the company’s purpose and profit motives? How is purpose inspiring discretionary effort and driving change? How are collaboration, shared accountability and innovation cultivated? Why do its people choose to invest their […]

The primary challenge for every new business is to win that first customer. Your product or service may be exceptional, but if its value proposition fails to attract customers, then there is no business.

Bob Schultek Author of The Gauntlet

Once you’ve earned a customer’s trust, the challenge shifts to retaining it. Your customer evaluates your relationship by asking: does your offering deliver the promised value? Is your quality reliable and your service personal? Are innovation and improvement, guided by their input, key components of your culture and your means for enhancing the value you offer? How do your offering and your people make a difference for them, contributing to their growth and progress?

Regardless of how big you’ve grown, your business lives on the street, with your customers. Preserving their trust compels that your highest priority remain what it was when your business was founded – appreciating what your customers value, and exploring how you may help them overcome their challenges to achieve their goals and aspirations.

During your journey, the need for better efficiency or higher productivity or reduced risk may seek to detour you away from your focus on market and customer. […]

Bottlenecks arise as a consequence of striving for functional efficiency. The premise is that maximizing profit requires that we optimize the use of resources. Since people tend to be the most expensive resource, being efficient demands that everyone be kept busy all the time.

It’s easier to measure efficiency by focusing on narrow, functional processes, without regard to cross-functional work flow and resulting outcomes. In pursuit of efficiency, the amount of work flowing into the functional process on which people work is kept high, increasing the likelihood that every employee, of every skill type, will be fully utilized.

But every process has a constraint or two, and people can only work the process as fast as those constraints allow. The consequence is that the process slows down. When there is more work to do, it takes longer to complete any one job. Work in process (WIP) builds just ahead of each constraint and invested hours accumulate like inventory. So keeping everyone busy all the time does not produce efficiency, and the resulting bottlenecks hinder the drive to move faster.

No one can be compelled to change, so no change initiative can succeed without dialogue between the advocates and those impacted by the change.

Bob Schultek Author of The Gauntlet

Beginning this discussion before the initiative is launched provides the opportunity for people to exchange conflicting opinions, explore possibilities and discuss obstacles as a precursor for committing to support the change.

For the advocates, the launch dialogue is an exercise in persuasion, intended to start an open, productive conversation with those impacted, aimed at convincing them that the change is worthy of their support.

Those affected by the change need an opportunity to express their concerns before they will allow themselves to consider proposed benefits.

The most successful change dialogues begin in response to an empathetic message from the advocates that expresses a sincere interest to uncover the worries of the affected parties. Asking those impacted how they interpret the change initiative, and listening to their responses, provides clues that enable the two sides to find common ground.

How do you encourage productive dialogue with those impacted by a planned change?

What methods have been most effective in earning support for your change initiatives?﻿

In the classic story, “The Wizard of Oz,” the four key players are each searching for something they lack. When challenged by the Wizard to steal the Witch’s broomstick, Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Lion and the Tinman begin a quest during which each discovers that hidden within them is what they seek. By sharing the journey, they help each other realize this insight.

All journeys can be transformational, from those that traverse space to others that navigate through ideas. Sharing a mission with others is a bonding and learning experience, enabling the participants to recognize their individual strengths and vulnerabilities, and to appreciate the power of collaboration to accelerate personal development and team progress. If people commit to a shared journey, they emerge from it with a greater sense of purpose, mastery and ownership, realizing the potential that lies within them.

This is why journeys matter, and why leaders driving change inspire their teams to embark on them in pursuit of innovation and improvement. Results produced from these initiatives benefit the organization, the leader, and the participants. The organization’s competitive advantage is strengthened, the leader’s credibility is validated, and the participants discover how they make a difference.

When heads are down, focused on getting things done, people can get stuck. Looking around, they often find that they are surrounded by people who are just as stuck as they are, so progress slows to a crawl.

That’s because one of the first questions we are taught to ask at work is: “What’s required here?” By meeting the spec, we get evaluated as being diligent, reliable and loyal.

But then, someone sees a different way forward, a path not previously explored. A few others recognize the potential and join in the quest, becoming a bonded team that wants to share the journey, moving exactly where they want to go. The result is a breakthrough.

Breakthroughs are driven by those who seek to make a difference, to do work that matters. They ask: “What’s the opportunity here?” For them, it’s about contribution and forward progress, not simply compliance. It’s a more challenging route, but for them and for the business, it’s worth it.

All workplaces include those who seek to protect their status quo, while others search for ways around obstacles, recognizing that these limitations are not real. Some people prefer to check boxes while others seek to draw the boxes.

When an employee fulfills obligations and achieves assigned goals with expected behavior, we recognize this as acceptable performance. The job is getting done.

Bob Schultek Author of The Gauntlet

But when one contributes more than the common standard, more than what’s expected, then that’s discretionary effort.

To improve results, leaders need advocates who can collaborate with them to drive productive change. For them to invest discretionary effort, these advocates need to appreciate how the change creates value for the business and how they can make a difference by making the change a reality.

So, the value generated by discretionary effort is significant…for the business, for the leader, and for those who contribute their energy and time to the effort.

For the business, improved results resulting from a successful change initiative create value.

For the leader, driving productive change validates their credibility and competency, but it also identifies high performing advocates who might have the potential, and aspiration, to lead.

For the investors of extra effort, the challenge of implementing valuable change offers an opportunity to make a strategic contribution to the organization’s future, to be exceptional, to breakthrough and be recognized. Discretionary effort creates careers.

How are you inspiring discretionary effort?How do you recognize those who choose to invest […]

A customer’s inquiry typically solicits a resolution to a stated, short-term problem. If your solution relieves the customer’s immediate pain, without contributing to their long term progress, then you’ve produced transactional value like any other commodity. And you’ve wasted an opportunity to reveal your organization’s experience, expertise and competency in a way that differentiates your business.

Bob Schultek
Author of
The Gauntlet

But, if prior to proposing your solution, you discover why resolving the customer’s need would contribute to their success, then your solution can become more than a transaction – it can be an investment in the customer’s future. Learning more about their current circumstances, and how their current challenge is constraining longer term progress, opens the door to a dialogue with the customer that transforms your solution – from the resolution of an immediate problem that produces transactional value into an opportunity that creates strategic value for the customer by removing an obstacle that is inhibiting the achievement of their goals.

Customers prefer to work with providers who create strategic value for them. Your solution creates strategic value when it:

Produces quantifiable benefits that resolve the customer’s immediate issue while also contributing to the achievement of a longer term goal or aspiration; andStrengthens the customer’s competitive […]

Wherever change energy is initially directed, there will be uncertainty, disruption, fear and discomfort among those who are impacted by the change. As a result, the first reaction to change initiatives is likely to be resistance; once the impact is clarified, advocates emerge who refocus their energy on learning more and seeking a means to contribute.

Leaders realize that inspiring these change advocates to invest their talent, energy and time is the first critical milestone in the change process. And once the champions have accepted the challenge, they need a channel for their investment. Without promptly identifying this path forward, energy and urgency diminish, creating a drift towards demotivation.

The channel provides direction and structure for the change initiative to be planned, implemented and monitored for effectiveness. As an example, the channel may be a process improvement initiative. For the leader, the channel provides an organized method to remain actively engaged in the change process, to influence its direction, and to sustain the inspiration that launched it. It offers a way for leaders to practice their skill of driving change.

For the champions, in addition to being the focus of their discretionary effort, the channel provides a medium to […]